Reflections from Ege University Medical School’s clinical internship mentoring program (2011–2018)

Objectives Ege University Medical School initiated system based integrated clinical internship in 2011. The need for a mentor who would closely monitor and guide the student in knowledge and skill gains for every clinical internship block and who would be an academic role model was well established. The aim of this study reports the results of the clinical internship mentoring program in the Ege University Medical School. Methods The Clinical Internship Counseling Committee reviewed similar programs in the literature, conducted focus group discussions, determined the wishes and needs of the students, and developed a mentoring program. Results The program was initiated by announcing the student-mentor matches and the procedure which was based on meetings of the student-mentor at the 1st, 8th and 13th weeks of the integrated internship. This meeting was designed to be a time for the mentor to guide the student to achieve the internship goals, to establish his/her internship progress file and to be an academic role model. At the final evaluation of the mentor, communication between student and the progress in the establishment of the internship progress file contributed to the 5% of the final internship success grade. Conclusions Evaluation of 7 years of experience led to the agreement that the goals of clinical internship program should be integrated into the newly established “Student Mentorship Program” that starts at the 1st year of the medical school.